Once We All Had Gills
Growing Up Evolutionist in an Evolving World
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- $9.99
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
In this book, Rudolf A. Raff reaches out to the scientifically queasy, using his life story and his growth as a scientist to illustrate why science matters, especially at a time when many Americans are both suspicious of science and hostile to scientific ways of thinking. Noting that science has too often been the object of controversy in school curriculums and debates on public policy issues ranging from energy and conservation to stem-cell research and climate change, Raff argues that when the public is confused or ill-informed, these issues tend to be decided on religious, economic, and political grounds that disregard the realities of the natural world. Speaking up for science and scientific literacy, Raff tells how and why he became an evolutionary biologist and describes some of the vibrant and living science of evolution. Once We All Had Gills is also the story of evolution writ large: its history, how it is studied, what it means, and why it has become a useful target in a cultural war against rational thought and the idea of a secular, religiously tolerant nation.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
With knowledge and humor, Raff relates the story of his personal and professional evolution as a scientist in this part-memoir, part-plea on behalf of the much-maligned sciences of today's political climate. A professor of biology at Indiana University, Raff (The Shape of Life: Genes, Development, and the Evolution of Animal Form) details his childhood interest in science, which began with a collection of dragonflies ("and their elegant cousins, the damselflies"), the mentors that encouraged him in high school, and his eventual founding of the innovative field of evolutionary development ("evo-devo"). Throughout his engaging life narrative, Raff holds forth on intriguing scientific topics, and makes his case for the teaching of evolution in schools, the consequences of scientific assumptions "harnessed to politics," and more. At once a cri de coeur from an eminent scientist on behalf of his profession, Raff's work is also an engaging and informative jaunt through the richly diverse history of evolution as a phenomenon and a course of study.
